Of Running
by LCAAS
Summary: Mikaela runs from herself until she learns that eventually, everyone has to stop.  This is. Uh. This is a Transformers/Chronicles of Narnia/Sarah Jane Adventures/Dr Who crossover. Yes. I...apologise?


_**AN: Dear crossover bunny: I hate you forever. (otherwise known as: 'this is what happens when I study', or 'apparently the words 'that's not posssible' is a challenge') This covers THREE fandoms, possibly four, depending on how you class that particular universe: Transformers (Bayverse), The Chronicles of Narnia and The Sarah Jane Adventures/Doctor Who. Yeah, I don't know what I'm on either. I own nothing except the idea.**_

**Title:**** Of Running  
>Author:<strong>_ bookworm_**  
><strong><strong>Rating:<strong>**** G****  
><strong>****Warnings****:**** ...odd crossovers? Occasional subtle religious themes (sorry, but Chronicles of Narnia, particularly Susan fixit fic, tends to lend itself to that)****  
><strong>**Summary****:**_**Mikaela runs from herself until she learns that eventually, everyone has to stop.**_

Mikaela loves Sam. _Truly, madly, deeply_ – isn't that how it goes? Even now, despite what Sam thinks, she's never stopped loving him. And that is why she ran. After Egypt, after thinking Sam was dead – that was when she realised how bad she had it. For a while after, it was good – they were together, and Sam was alive. And then he proposed. And the only thing she could think, sitting there staring at the ring and Sam's hopeful eyes, was how bad it hurt when she thought he was dead, and how much worse it would be, if she binds her life to his, and it happens again. And it will, she knows (_it happened to her fathe_r, some small part of her whispers, _they all leave her in the end_). Sam says he wants to be normal, but he's a hero to the core. What he really wants, Mikaela knows, is to do something worthwhile. And in that instant, with Sam on his knees in front of her, Mikaela faces the truth about herself – that she cannot bear to be in Mrs Lennox's position, waiting to see if her man comes home. That she cannot bear to face the fact that Sam's need to be a hero may yet see him taken from her again, this time more permanently. In that one fragile instant, Mikaela becomes a coward, and she runs. She ignores Sam's hurt and confusion, and later, she ignores his increasingly desperate attempts to see her. Both Ratchet and Bumblebee call, but she throws her phone out of the window and refuses to answer. Even Wheelie is kicked out. Faced with her own insecurities, she cannot bear for them to see her like this (or perhaps she cannot bear to face herself). So she leaves. She packs a bag and sneaks out, her only aim to get as far away as possible.

The next few months are a blur of hitchhiking and part-time jobs in sleazy pubs and truck stops. Eventually, she winds up somewhere on the outskirts of Chicago, and it's there that she meets Mrs Jones. Mrs Jones ('call me Susan') is an old widow, who runs a home for girls and women from less than ideal backgrounds. The converted house is a refuge for those trying to escape, and a safe haven for those who have nowhere else to go. Susan runs it with a strangely old-fashioned British gentility, knows all 'her girls' by name, and generally tries to ensure that everyone gets the best chance she can give them. Over copious cups of tea Mikaela forms a strange sort of friendship with the elderly lady, who tells her that she agreed to let her stay "because you had that look in your eyes". Susan's son finds her a decent, if somewhat underpaid job in the local garage, and slowly Mikaela starts to piece her life back together. If Susan finds it strange how an odd procession of cars with tinted windows starts to shows up once Mikaela has established herself, she never comments. Mikaela, on the other hand, continues to refuse to speak to any of them other than Ratchet, who she tells simply that she is sorry, but that she isn't coming back. Eventually, (and a part of Mikaela feels betrayed that they stop so soon) they stop coming. Bumblebee comes only the once, but she hides until he leaves. Sam never comes, and Mikaela tells herself that she deserves that.

The house itself is never empty, with Susan's own family (two daughters and a son, and multiple grandkids) not to mention 'her girls' (and _their _families) forever coming in and out. It is comforting and welcoming, and Mikaela, like so many others, realises quickly that Susan is to blame for the subtle thread of comfort and safety that thrums seemingly through the very walls. They all do their own thing, for the most part, but dinner is a shared time, _family_, the way Mikaela has never had a chance to have (or only dimly recalls). Before she knows it, Mikaela is a welcomed, accepted, _expected _part of their family. When Mikaela finds out about Carly it is purely by accident, passing by on an errand for Susan when she spies them in the distance. It is obvious that Sam is in love, and neither of them see her as she quickly finishes her business and flees. She tells herself that it shouldn't hurt, that Sam has every right to fall in love with someone else. She tells herself that she doesn't love him anymore, and knows it to be a lie. When she gets home that night, Susan takes one look at her, and gently but firmly sits her down and simply holds her for a while. As Mikaela weeps, Susan tells her about her own family. Mikaela had seen pictures – four siblings, and Susan is easily recognisable, the older sister, dark haired and unwrinkled, but still with the same clear eyes – and now she learns their names.

"I ran away too, once." Susan tells her. "I couldn't face the fact that we had been granted… a chance to see something supremely wonderful, and then told that we would never have it again. My siblings somehow found ways to cope, but I could not. So I ran. I followed my parents to America, and lost myself in fashion and society. As long as I kept busy, I could pretend that I didn't hurt. I told my siblings that I did not remember, and that they should stop playing games. Peter and Lucy looked at me with disappointment, but Edmund knew, I think. The day before…before the train crash… Ed told me that one day, I would have to stop running. After… I was broken. Now, I couldn't run, although that was all that I wanted to do. I railed and screamed at … at God, who had taken everything from me again. And then… I met some people, some amazing, wonderful, terrifying people. They were very good at running, but for different reasons to mine. They helped me heal, slowly. To patch the pieces back together. And then one day I looked up, and the sky was blue again, and I knew what my siblings had found. Lucy had said to me, once, "You aren't looking carefully enough", and I finally understood. After that, I stopped running. I came back to America, and married my husband. And so here I am – and I am done with running."

Susan kisses away Mikaela's tears that night, brushes her hair and puts her to bed as if she were just a small child again, and Mikaela dreams of a mother she cannot recall. The next morning, Susan hands her a ticket to London. "Sometimes," she tells her, "We may run away only to find out that we have been running towards what we always need. And sometimes, we just need to get away for a while. My friends there will look after you." In London, Mikaela is met by a middle aged lady with a ready smile ("You must be Mikaela, Susan's been telling me about you and I've been hoping that I'd get to meet you. I'm Sarah Jane Smith."), who takes her home and introduces her to her son and the neighbour's children. All three are younger than she is, but she is made welcome, and somehow, she finds herself quickly a part of their circle. Over the next month, Mikaela learns that the universe is a lot smaller than she thought it was (and Earth is hardly isolated in the universe) even as she slowly starts to mend the broken pieces of her heart and let Sam go. And yes, there is a lot of running involved, but for the first time in a long, long time, Mikaela feels that she is actually useful. Although she never finds what Susan did, she does learn that Sam isn't the only one who wants to be a hero.

When the Decepticons attack Chicago, Mikaela is frantic. That day Susan had gone into town with her daughter, and never returned. She catches the first ride she can back to America (she may have threatened some people with connections, and it turns out that Sarah Jane has a lot of pull in some surprising circles), and after the battle is won, Mikaela is one of the first to volunteer to help search for survivors (Later, it will register that Susan's family had been thoroughly unsurprised to see her show up, even despite her...unusual means of transport). The death toll is staggeringly high, and Mikaela guiltily hides the fact that she is more concerned about the Autobots she knows who are missing than those humans who she didn't know at all. When they find Susan, alive and with a small group of survivors, many proclaim it a miracle, that one so old and seemingly frail would make it out. The survivors are all quick to praise Susan and her daughter, who both kept calm and kept their group together and safe as much through force of will as anything else. Mikaela will carry until her dying day the image of Susan, regal despite her age, walking carefully but calmly out of the dust and dirt, and gravely thanking Optimus Prime with courtly grace. Unlike many, Susan seems neither surprised, nor particularly intimidated by the towering form of the Autobots, and Mikaela can't help but see a lady (_a queen_) thanking one who is her equal. Having learnt something of her story (four siblings, three of whom die in a train crash, an adventure in the London countryside - in retrospect, it is obvious), and having met her friends, Mikaela thinks she understands why. She still cannot face Sam (and maybe never will, now that he has Carly) but…perhaps, Mikaela thinks, perhaps it is time that she stopped running too. Squaring her shoulders she prepares to humble herself and seek forgiveness from those that she has hurt.


End file.
